Keep Trying
by Dude the Guy
Summary: Ash should be happy in Izumo, but it's hard to let things go.  Ash/Eiji; spoilers for the end of the series, in a way.


Ash couldn't relax, even in Izumo. At first, everything was all right—caught up in the warm welcomes from Ibe, Eiji's family, and, most of all, from Eiji, Ash thought that maybe it could be like Blanca said—that it really could be that easy to put his gun down and leave the violence behind. Ash thought that maybe, now that Eiji was safe at home and Ash was leagues away from New York, he wasn't as much of a threat anymore. That, out of his element, where there was no one else to escape from, that he could be safe for Eiji.

When Ash was with Eiji, he could breathe. Things really did seem far away and behind closed doors. Even when Eiji ran his fingertips over the scar on Ash's side where Lao had stabbed him as he ran from the library, Ash was able to relax into his touch, lean into it a little, breathe easy, and pretend that his life in New York was something that could no longer touch him.

But when he was alone, Ash couldn't stop looking out of the corners of his eyes. He walked around the town at night and saw shadows move behind him. His footsteps echoed and became phantoms. A long time ago, Eiji had said that Izumo was where all the gods lived. Ash was beginning to believe that the gods themselves were watching him, judging him. Waiting for the right moment to condemn him.

_Well, what are you waiting for? _ Ash asked them, silently, desperately, foolishly. _You can have me. As long as Eiji lives, it doesn't matter what happens to me._

"You are not happy here," Eiji murmured one night as he and Ash walked home from a late trip to the convenience store for a pack of beer.

"Yes, I am," Ash replied, sucking any betraying emotion from his voice.

"You are lying, Ash," Eiji said, his voice with a sharper edge than normal. "I notice. You look so… unsure. You cannot be happy, even here." _Even with me _was the unspoken end to that sentence, and Ash knew it as well as Eiji did. In the glow of the nearby streetlight, Eiji's profile stood out in ultracontrast. Ash could see the individual strands of Eiji's bangs shift in the breeze, and that was where he focused his gaze rather than on Eiji himself.

"If I relax, I could die," said Ash. "So could you. You almost did, once. That's how it always is."

"Yes, but that is in the past!" Eiji insisted, stepping in front of Ash and blocking his path. Ash still refused to meet his eyes. "And in New York," he added quietly. "We are okay here. No one wants us in Izumo. There is no danger here."

"There is _always_ danger, Eiji!" Ash said, finally looking straight at his friend. He pretended that it was the odd angle of the light from the streetlight making Eiji's eyes look brighter than normal, but he could not fool himself that well.

Softer now, Ash said, "I have spent my entire life being chased, Eiji. I guess I can't just move on like that. Pretend that it wasn't just a couple of months ago that I was trying to kill Golzine, walking the line between life and death every day."

He sighed. "I'm glad I'm here. And I'm trying."

"I know," Eiji said. "But I don't like that you have to try."

Ash said nothing to that, because there was nothing to be said.

They walked the rest of the way to Eiji's house mostly in silence, breaking it only to make the smallest of comments on the smallest of things. At his front door, Eiji stopped suddenly. Without looking at Ash, he said, "Let's go to Tokyo this weekend, get away from here. We can get hotel room and visit for a while. It's a big city. You might like it there."

And Ash considered the back of Eiji's head, and said, "Okay."

* * *

><p>In Tokyo, Ash's paranoia felt justified. He was more at home among crowds and busy people and with the knowledge that something dangerous was lurking underneath. He kept Eiji close to him, and kept his wits about him, and he moved them through the crowds like wind. Ash felt many pangs of guilt for the way he'd so easily shifted back into the element Eiji was trying so hard to help him leave behind, but Eiji seemed so thrilled to be in Tokyo with Ash that Ash pushed them away and just tried to enjoy existing in the city the best way he knew how.<p>

Eiji showed Ash all that he could, from Tokyo Tower to the stores his sister liked best to what seemed to Ash like every single shrine within the city's boundaries. And then at night, they'd retire to their hotel room, and fall asleep drinking cheap beer and watching television. Eiji's enthusiasm was infectious. It reminded Ash of that summer in Cape Cod, when in the midst of everything, he and Eiji had a chance to be themselves. It was nice, and so was this, and Ash could not stop himself from thinking so.

On the third and last night of their visit to Tokyo, Ash and Eiji sat on the balcony of their hotel room with a case of beer and watched the city go by below, dazed and dazzled by the lights (well, at least, Eiji was). They would be leaving for Izumo in the morning, and Ash was wondering why they couldn't just stay here, together.

"My parents would miss us," Eiji said, and Ash mentally cursed himself—he hadn't realized he'd said that aloud. "I mean… If we just stayed, they would worry and go crazy trying to find us. That would be bad." He laughed to himself—it was almost a giggle—and Ash said nothing.

"But it would be nice," Eiji said, more to himself than to Ash, and Ash again said nothing in response.

Then, Ash heard Eiji's beer can hit the glass tabletop between them with certainty. Ash turned to see why, and Eiji's hand grasped his clumsily, and suddenly Eiji's face crashed into his.

Ash froze; he barely breathed. It's not like he was unused to kisses being forced onto him, but suddenly it was Eiji and not one of the scores of perverts from the past. _Eiji._

Everything that had been haunting him ever since he'd come to Japan—ever since he'd met Eiji—just everything—was smashing against Ash's mind like tidal waves and scattering his thoughts. Remotely, Ash realized that he was panicking.

Eiji pulled away with a gasp, and Ash opened his eyes—he hadn't realized he'd closed them—to see Eiji's face reflecting his own thoughts. But Ash also saw a healthy dose of fear. Apologies were falling from Eiji's lips like raindrops, and Ash couldn't make them out because half of Eiji's tangent was in Japanese, and the alcohol in his system was muddling the English, half, but he did catch something along the lines of, "I'm just like them," as Eiji fumbled for the armrests of his chair, clumsily trying to stand, and that didn't sit well with Ash at all.

Ash reached out, took hold of Eiji's wrist, pulled him back into his chair, and kissed him back.

He had no idea what he was doing. He couldn't think; the waves from before had become a storm, and he couldn't grasp a single idea of how he was feeling long enough to figure out what exactly he wanted. The last thing Ash wanted to be doing was kissing Eiji—really, this was the last part of Ash's word that Eiji belonged in, because Eiji was pure and innocent and so beautiful and Ash couldn't let him be more corrupted than he already was—but even moreso than that, Ash, couldn't bear to think that Eiji would even think to compare himself to everyone who had hurt Ash before. So Ash tuned out his own feelings and focused instead on the way Eiji's hand trembled underneath his, and the way Eiji couldn't figure out how to breathe properly—was this really the first time he had kissed someone?—and the tiny noises that were originating somewhere in the back of Eiji's throat that set Ash's mind spinning all over again.

They kissed for a long, long time, there on the balcony. Eiji couldn't kiss worth a damn, and it hurt sometimes, when their teeth clicked together and when Eiji bit down just a little too hard on Ash's tongue. Ash knew there were so many tiny things he had learned to turn the kiss around and bring Eiji to his knees, but he ignored them all and kissed Eiji just as clumsily, matching him bite for bite, misfire for misfire, lick for lick. He relished the times when it hurt, even—it kept his brain from going on autopilot and his heart from clocking out of the situation. It was the least he could do to keep himself from pushing Eiji away at this moment when their relationship was at its most fragile. The awkwardness made it real.

When Eiji finally pulled away, he pressed his lips softly against the corner of Ash's mouth once before detangling his fingers from Ash's where they'd held each other so tightly on the arm rests. And then Eiji stood up, mumbled something about getting ready for bed, and left the balcony a little quicker than Ash had imagined he wanted to. Jesus, he really was shy when it came to this kind of thing, Ash observed blankly.

Ash sighed and finished his beer from earlier and then when ahead and finished Eiji's too. He considered cracking open another, but before he could act on his thought, Eiji returned to the balcony long enough to tell Ash that the bathroom was free, uncertainty coming off of him in waves.

Ash washed up for the night quickly, and then he switched up the bathroom light, bathing the room in darkness. In the main part of their hotel room, Eiji's form was outlined softly in the moonlight. Ash walked past his own bed and paused to look at Eiji, to watch his back rise and fall with his even, deep breathing. Then, he noticed that the covers on the unoccupied side of Eiji's bed had been turned down. A silent invitation that Ash knew he was under no obligation to take, that Eiji would understand if he didn't. That, if Ash did deny it, things might go back to normal between them, and the night's events would fade into booze-hazed memory.

Ash was surprised to find himself opposed to that thought.

He slid into bed beside his friend and wrapped a strong arm around Eiji's torso, pulling the boy closer to him. Eiji didn't stir. As Ash drifted off to sleep, he realized that this was the first time in a very long time that he'd felt completely at ease being beside someone else, aside from all of his conflicting emotions about what this meant for their friendship. Then, he smiled, because the last time he felt this way, it was with Eiji, too.

* * *

><p>Another late-night trip to the convenience store. All around Ash, the shadows skulked, shifting in the corners of Ash's mind, but never making themselves fully present. Ash wondered if they were just waiting to strike, and tensed.<p>

"Ash?" Eiji said, startling Ash out of his thoughts.

"I'm fine, Eiji," Ash said, picking up the pace a little towards the house and remembering the last time they'd had a conversation that started like this, on the night that Eiji had suggested they go to Tokyo. He heard Eiji's footsteps quicken behind him, and then Eiji's hand brushed against his, and Eiji threaded his little finger with Ash's. It was the fragile gesture of promises not always kept, but Ash felt the shadows backing down in response, so he took a deep breath and kept walking forward with Eiji at his side.


End file.
